Natural dog training - pushing

snownose

corvus

If a dog is taught to suppress a natural behaviour, I wonder if it's still there and just out of sight?

 

I am not a novice when it comes to owning difficult breeds.....AND, I realize I need to offer up something to make sure certain drives are satisfied.....those who have known me for a while know that I don't sit on my butt and just let my dogs lay around....there is plenty to be had.......

 

I didn't suggest you were or did. But you did say you had worked hard to minimise the prey drive in your huskies. I wonder if the prey drive CAN be minimised, or if it's just suppressed, or if you minimise it by satisfying their prey drive.

Think this......

and this....

Lee Charles Kelley

I'm puzzled by your explanation

I don't see how the pushing does anything for the prey drive specifically. The dog is not overcoming the resistance of your hand by means of increased prey drive, per se, but in order to get the treat, which may have the added benefit of increasing or helping a dog's prey drive. If I try hard enough, I get a reward. Which might eventually generalize to prey drive. If I pursue that target long enough and hard enough, I will get something out of it. Any benefit of the exercise is from getting the reward, rather than just the exercise itself.

I also don't see how the exercise, regardless of what it does for prey drive, helps to get the dog to disengage from chasing the cat. The dog disengages from the cat because doing things your way is rewarding, not because their prey drive is uninhibited or directed toward you.

I will agree that dogs learn in reinforcement mode, rather than punishment mode. I think that punishment does not teach. It only stops something. If a dog avoids something in the future to avoid that punishment again, then that is -R. But they also learn by +R. And that is proven in an entire field of literature and studies going back 40 something years, including the landmark work of Karen Pryor. And I mention that regardless of you misgivings of Pryor.

But I don't see the working for something for a treat as -R, by means of avoiding hunger. My dog can train only an hour after a meal.

I don't think I stop any drives, but I can channel them. Like I pointed out, if he's excited about a squirrel or people walking down the street, I can toss the kong and he can go catch that and get his "chase and get that" itch scratched. So, there's nothing wrong with working with a prey drive and many people with Labs and other hunting dogs go as far as competing in field trials. Those are dogs who's job it is to work in prey drive much of the time. And the dogs are trained to sublimate their prey drive to the benefit of man through reward training.

Lee Charles Kelley

When a dog feels a strong reduction in tension, he feels better... Or why a dog comes when called. It doesn't matter what form of training or ideology you use, the dog obeys because he associates the behavior with a reduction in tension. And technically, that's not positive, but negative reinforcement. 

Oh, I LOVE this! I totally agree! This makes so much sense to me. When Jaia is outside the fence and it's time to come in, I call him in and he doesn't want to, so he whines a bit (an indication of the tension). I step outside the gate toward him (increasing the tension) and he 'breaks' and comes running in. Same thing when he has the frisbee and I want it back to throw it again. I step toward him, he whines and then 'breaks' and comes running.

He doesn't get +R to come in the gate. In fact, coming in after a nice play session is hard to do because he wants to play all day. He doesn't get +P for NOT coming in because I have never punished him for not coming when I call him. If anything, it's negative reinforcement for breaking that tension.

I never before understood why stepping toward him makes him whine and bring me the frisbee.  But it's 100% reliable. If he didn't want to give up the frisbee, he could run from me (as B'asia does - but I'm working on that)

corvus

If a dog is taught to suppress a natural behaviour, I wonder if it's still there and just out of sight? The experiences with the lagomorphs make me suspect that just because dogs can be taught to suppress their natural behaviours doesn't mean the natural urge to engage in those behaviours has been dealt with once and for all. I feel like it would be better to meet that need rather than suppress it.

You make great points Corvus, and something I think about all of the time, in how we are or are not fulfilling our dogs' needs. Or any animal's needs. I can really relate to your explanations when you talk about Kit, as I go through a lot of the same things with my lovebird MoJo. Keeping her mind occupied well, and fulfilling her needs, has been a learning curve that has taken a lot of time, observation, and research. Not to mention what made it a lot harder is that MoJo came to me lacking a lot of essential bird skills that they should know, so a lot had to be slowly taught/brought out in her. But the fact that MoJo too needs to have constant access to things to chew - for her it's paper-based things, and wooden things. Her cage is always equipped with a destructible item as that is something that she just needs to do. When she's out of her cage, it's evident in how she pecks at the keyboard, or chews on a blanket, or tries to play with wires on the computer mouse. So when she is out she always has acceptable chew items nearby me. I also recognize her need to fly, and for this reason I keep her fully-flighted, I do not clip her wings, and she has the opportunity to exercise her muscles and be the bird that she's truly meant to be by having free-flying times around a room. She also needs things that she can preen regularly, so for that she has toys/perches in her cage that promote that, with fuzzy toys, and toys with strings that she can preen and groom. When she's out I'm her preening/grooming social partner, as she nibbles in my hair and preens it to (her) perfection. These are things I consider essential 'needs', and to try to suppress them would only be doing her harm.

In the dogs, I see the same types of things, and how the needs for different dogs are so different. Gaci is a hunter at heart, through and through. When we go out on a walk, her nose is to the ground, she is digging and going into every old animal hole she can find. If she catches a scent she will follow it until its end. When she is out for a walk it's not just "to run", it's always in the frame of "what can I hunt"? I see it in her play, when we play tug or chase toys. Her chasing is very prey-driven, including the "shake-kill" at the end without bringing it back.  Whereas with Shimmer she is completely the opposite. She rarely has her nose to the ground, and she basically has fun running in general, with no aim or destination, and she loves just following Gaci from place to place. She doesn't care for tug, and she doesn't chase toys much, she'll chase a few but prefers just to hold on to them and play with them by throwing them around. Her favorite style of play is direct play with another dog or me, whereas doesn't play a whole lot with other dogs, unless it's a good game of tug or chase. They both like to chew, but Gaci is much more into chewing bones than Shimmer is. So they have different needs, which require them to be expressed differently. Shimmer needs a lot more social contact to feel like her needs are being met, actual hands on, attention-on-her time. Whereas Gaci doesn't need in nearly as much.

I try in every way possible to fulfill the individual needs of animals, because I find in doing so, it allows them to be the animal they truly are. Sometimes things do need to modified, such as Gaci cannot run the countryside and hunt until she feels tired to stop, she would go for hours and hours and hours, but she gets that opportunity in moderation, and in other forms such as tug, chasing, and tracking (giving her nose/function a purpose).

It's most interesting because I'm moving in a month. From a country setting to a very urban setting. The dogs are going to need to adjust to a new style of living quite a bit, and even MoJo will need a bit of adjusting to a new home, although it shouldn't be as drastic. I have to rethink just how their needs might change, and how I will be able to continue to fulfill those needs that they have in a new environment. Because we won't have the acres and acres to run on and hunt, and even finding places to practice tracking will be harder to find, although I'm sure a short drive will find me places I can work. But then again on the other hand the city is prone with smells all on its own, such that it might not be that hard at all to suit Gaci's hunting needs, as the smells of people, dogs, other animals, birds, etc, in parks, will be vast, and give her lots to keep her occupied. So it might be easier, it might be harder, we will just have to see as we all adjust to new circumstances.

I started Monday doing the "push" exercise with B'asia. I go out twice a day and play frisbee with Jaia while B'asia runs around with Jaia carrying a frisbee in her mouth. Two times during the week, she let me have the frisbee from her mouth. This is unprecedented. During this morning's session alone, she let me have it twice and came very close to giving it up a couple more times. Nothing else has changed.

I'm just sayin'...

FourIsCompany

I'm just sayin'...

Would you be able to get a video of what you are working on?

 Do you mean a video of the pushing or the frisbee retrieval?

FourIsCompany

 Do you mean a video of the pushing or the frisbee retrieval?

Yes.

It would be interesting to see it in action. I know that one method for teaching Shadow to fetch didn't work but another did. I thought he would fetch because he is mixed with Lab but it just wasn't one of his natural want-to's.

Or, do you have a way of explaining how the push exercise affects your experience positively or provides a better recall or how it affects prey drive in a way that benefits your games or training? Nothing against LCK or anyone else, for that matter. Sometimes, just hearing it in different words makes all the difference. That's happened to me a number of times. I saw your previous explanation with the analogy of a chess nerd finding the impetus to approach a female chess nerd. I like the colloquial feel of it, even though I didn't initially see how it would apply. I am not commenting on it now or disagreeing with. And it just proves my point, in a sense, that sometimes, a different set of words for description provides the insight.

For example, as I shall mention for the umpteenth time, Chuffy once pointed out how dogs escalate what has worked, even sporadically. That thought helped me to consider clickers seriously.

ron2

Yes.

 

I will work on getting a video. Or 2. It probably won't be until next week, though.  

Cool beans. I know we talk a lot about what we do but sometimes just seeing it explains it quite well. At the very least, it's another excuse to admire your beautiful dogs.

 

FourIsCompany

Oh, I LOVE this! I totally agree! This makes so much sense to me. When Jaia is outside the fence and it's time to come in, I call him in and he doesn't want to, so he whines a bit (an indication of the tension). I step outside the gate toward him (increasing the tension) and he 'breaks' and comes running in. Same thing when he has the frisbee and I want it back to throw it again. I step toward him, he whines and then 'breaks' and comes running.

 

I love your take on it! At first I thought, "No. That's not right." But I wasn't looking at it from a purely energetic standpoint, and you were! Normally I'd tell people to run away from the dog, not move toward him! But it sounds like you guys have this little dance worked out pretty well.

When I train the recall, one of the main things I do is put the dog in a down/stay, then walk away, past the point where the dog feels comfortable and I can see a little nervousness coming up in her. Sometimes I'll jump around, or circle around her in a kind of low, crouched dance. I've always thought that doing these exercise increases the dog's social attraction to me, her desire to re-connect. But looked at from Jaia's pov, I can see that it also increases a dog's internal tension. So with Jaia his desire seems to be to NOT come in, so when you take a step toward him, his resultant behavior doesn't have as much to do with wanting to re-connect with you as it does with reducing his internal tension! That's brilliant.

I think this kind of goes back to something I've always theorized and philosophized about, but that was made very clear to me when I read Sascha Semyonova's paper "The Social Behaviors of Domesticated Dogs." A dog is willing to give up something he desires if doing so either maintains group harmony, or if another member of the group has a stronger desire than he does (which can be the same thing).

Just as a side topic, I think this is why I feel it's important to think more in terms of desire rather than intent, both in how the dog's own behavior is shaped more by desire, but also in how they relate to us as well. I think we've all had experiences where we're convinced that the dog "knows" what our intent is in a situation. But I think that instead, they feel, and I mean quite viscerally and directly, what our desire. They feel it in their bones. Yes, Jaia wants to stay out in the yard and play until he flops. You want him to come in. But I think your desire seems to win out in this particularly situation because the strength of desire is actually important to Jaia's social instincts than his own needs are at that moment. And the little increase in his internal tension when you take a step toward him gives him an impetus to come running...

Thanks for the enlightenment,

LCK 

This is video of today’s "B’asia Frisbee Challenge". Before this week (and the pushing exercises), B’asia has NEVER dropped the Frisbee or let us get it from her or let us get near her when she has it. She used to carry it the whole time and even after she comes in the house for a while. Several times this week, I was able to approach her without her running away and have her drop the Frisbee. Today, I asked my husband to work with her because he’s horrible with the camera and more importantly, he’s FANTASTIC with B’asia. His is so good at reading her energy and responding appropriately! He’s not a “dog person” so I was amazed and thrilled at the results he got with B’asia today. He was pretty delighted himself as this is the first time he’s seen the progress that I’m attributing to pushing. He never thought we’d be able to get her to give the Frisbee up! I didn’t expect to have such good progress to share with you.

 

These are a few clips from today. They were taken in the sequence that you will see them and you can see progress in just this short time. Jaia was out with us for a while, but I put him back in the house so we could concentrate on B’asia for the bulk of the video. We were out there maybe 20-25 minutes.

 

The second clip (Jaia on the Right) shows what I was talking about earlier. If Jaia doesn’t want to bring the Frisbee, we step toward him, increasing the tension, and then Jaia whines (his response to the tension) and then breaks it by running to us. LCK, I’m really happy to see that you understood and appreciated my take on that.

 

I’ll tape DH “pushing” with B’asia later. Enjoy!

B'asia Frisbee Challenge!

spiritdogs

To be honest, not everyone WANTS to increase their dog's drive, or have the dog make contact (think frail or disabled owner, or someone with toddlers in the home) but perhaps they do want to increase the dog's general level of confidence.  I have found that a bit of good old fashioned backyard agility training can do that (or just finding natural obstacles to hike over together).  There's something about mastering the obstacles that works wonders on quite a few dogs.  So, if pushing doesn't appeal to you for some reason, there are certainly other options. 

 

*Raises hand* Yeah, me.

We have a dog who has lots of confidence.  In fact, I often think of her as "pushy" because she IS, quite literally.  She physically "pushes" others to get to what she wants.  She pushes past us, other dogs, the cat, inanimate objects, undergrowth.... the baby.  It's NOT something I like to encourage.  I do the opposite.  I wait for her to STOP contact and hold herself back and away, exercise a little self control.  THEN she gets what she wants.

So, if "pushing" is beneficial, is what I am doing harmful?

It doesn't APPEAR to be (to me).  I think dogs SHOULD have some level of inhibition.  I think that's healthy.  When "something" inside the dog inhibits them from rummanging in my dustbin or jumping up on my work surfaces, I don't WANT them to work past it.  My question is: Is this process selective?  If it DOES increase the expression of the dog's drives, does it only do so in appropriate ways?  Are there any instances where this exercise, as well as encouraging a dog to play for example, has also instigated the dog to try something he wouldn't have done before - something the owner didn't WANT him to do before?

(This is not to say I discard the idea entirely - I asked the same question re clicker training eons ago and I am now comfortable using a clicker and encouraging novel behaviours.) 

I am highly un-astonished that this exercise results in dogs playing where they didn't before, or results in more play.  This is how DOGS play with one another.  I am not convinced this is directly related to prey drive (although I'll concede that play/prey are linked, I don't think they are one and the same). 

Dogs and juveniles of other species play to learn about the things they need to do as adults.  Hunting is only ONE of those things.  Contesting over resources with another adult is another thing, and it has nothing to do with prey drive - does it?  Similarly, learning to live together harmoniously with others (of the same species and not of the same species) also has nothing to do with prey drive and this is another thing that is learned and strengthened through play.  Is it being suggested that the tension/release and the feel-good factor that follows, ONLY comes from "the hunt", tapping into prey drive?  Not sure if that's what is being said, but I don't agree with that notion at all.

Hmmm... Where to start? If you have a dog with lots of confidence, there's no need to do a confidence building exercise that I can see. Why would you? Pushing is a confidence building exercise for dogs who lack confidence. So, I wouldn't advise it for your dog... unless he has other behavioral issues.

Pushing (in our context) is not about making a B'asia want to play. It's about having her be willing to give up her "prey" to us. She LOVES to play. She just won't give up the frisbee once she has "caught" it.

The "pushing" exercise does not make a dog "pushy". It teaches a dog to deal with feelings of insecurity and even (hopefully) fear. It teaches a dog to "push past" emotional confusion, irrational desires to attack and to withdraw (fight or flight).

Chuffy

I think dogs SHOULD have some level of inhibition.  I think that's healthy.  When "something" inside the dog inhibits them from rummanging in my dustbin or jumping up on my work surfaces, I don't WANT them to work past it. 

I don't know what to say. Have you read the attached articles? Do you know the purpose of the exercise?

Chuffy

If it DOES increase the expression of the dog's drives

 

I don't think it increases drive. It teaches the dog to deal with his drive.